L'absinthe
by coeurgryffondor
Summary: Arthur's lost his muse, and so has Francis, but there's something else in the cool autumn air. / AU FrUK as in countries as humans, historically accurate for late 19th century Paris.


Author's note: On Tumblr dearest wifeofbath sent me the idea for this, because she can read my mind and knows me too well. Wrote this before NaNoWriMo, but now I'm 20,000 words into my novel so I thought I'd post in celebration. This was meant to be short but it took on a life of it's own and is probably one of my favorite things I've ever written now, with accidental parallels and that ending.

The French translations are all worked into the text, and if I messed anything up (which I really hope I didn't, as I wrote this living in France) we'll blame it on Arthur*. I shall be returning to this time period with FrUK later, because it was just too delicious.

*Thanks to Saemi67 for your corrections, that was what I had originally written and was convinced it must be wrong. Oh you tricky tricky French pronouns...

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><p><strong>L'absinthe<strong>

Arthur had only met Giannina Zanetti once, in an accidental rendez-vous years ago when he'd stopped in Paris on a trip back to London. That damn painter Francis Bonnefoy had been so proud of her, smiling like some stupid schoolboy at his little lover, his great muse. She really had been one of the most beautiful women, Arthur realized days later when he could think of nothing else but her charms and grace and being. She became all he could think of.

Having no control over his inspiration, she caused Arthur to go on a writing spree of stories about mysterious women with names as mashed in ancestry as their breeding, pale skin and dark haired, women who wore corsets tightly laced and little else. Arthur hated the stories, hated the romance and the allure they presented, what it said of him as an author. Hated that they were all about her. Hated that they were his best selling works.

But he's lost his inspiration again, and three months of writer's block have produced exactly six words written on a single piece of paper: "In Paris he fell in love." Four of the words are crossed out, leaving only "Paris" and "love". His editor had looked at it and pronounced that there was only one cure to be had.

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><p>Surprising no one, Francis Bonnefoy still lives in Paris's Quartier Piglet, a place filled with prostitutes and prostitutes and more prostitutes. He's tried to explain there was more to Piglet, artists and cabarets and the bohemian dream, but Arthur never really cared.<p>

Still surprising no one, Francis Bonnefoy answers the door drunk, probably high as well no doubt, and as close to naked as the chill in the autumn air will allow. What does surprise Arthur are the puffy patches of skin under his eyes.

"Have you been crying?" Arthur asks indignantly. He never told Francis he was coming, never has, never has had to. And while Francis will always respond in French, Arthur speaks to him in English; the only reason he maintains this relationship is because Francis understands English and Arthur understands French. Or at least, that's what they tell people.

The sarcastic response, dripping off the Frenchman's tongue like sweet wine or watered-down paint, never comes. Instead he stands, swaying on his feet, trying to focus on Arthur's face.

"What the fuck is wrong with you?" Arthur asks in French, because it's the only French he really does have a grasp on, becoming more outraged with every passing moment. In the street a woman makes a sound of outrage at his foul language, as if she's not walking around in a red-light district.

Even that does not elicit a witty remark, some worthy response. Only three words, half of what Arthur had managed in months, and they are the most breathtaking words for all the wrong reasons. That night Arthur will scribble them down, and those three words alone could inspire his first novel to come of this trip. They are raw and needy and real and come from somewhere deep in a man's soul, an idea that only a Frenchman can express, coming straight from the heart. Arthur catches him as he falls, closing the door behind them. Francis repeats the words, over and over, and Arthur wants to beg him to stop but can't as he drags the man back up the stairs.

Oh beautiful Giannina Zanetti, perfect Ninette. Three minutes with her had produced seven novels and nine short stories alone from an unromantic English author. What else had the muse done with her life? Who else had she enchanted? How could anyone have loved so deeply any other after her?

But Francis never screamed the words, only cried them, moaned them, groaned them as he held Arthur's chest to his face. Oh Ninette. Oh Ninette.

"Elle est morte."

She is dead.

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><p>They're going to Le Chat Noir several nights later, in some vain attempt to cheer up Francis. Or, at least, to get him in pants.<p>

The owner (at least Arthur thinks he said he was the owner? Francis is too busy being miserable to translate.) informed Arthur, in very quick French, that Le Chat Noir was the place to meet the most famous men in Paris, to see the world's greatest cabaret and meet with foreigners from everywhere.

Arthur, being English, doesn't really care for foreigners; they are, in fact, only slightly about Frenchmen at the bottom of his List of Things Arthur Cares For. They are still well below cold tea and the nonsense he writes.

He's not sure what he thinks of the show. He's never been to a cabaret before, and it seems to Arthur a mix of acts intended to amuse and scandalize, which the acts do alternate in doing to him. But Francis, who would rave in long letters with hurried handwriting about the cabaret, only slumps in his chair, resting his head on Arthur's shoulder. Thankfully he does not drink.

Back at Francis's apartment the exhausted frog pulls him down onto the bed as he collapses, and Arthur struggles against arms that seem to have suddenly found some strength. He's tired too, wants to crawl into his sorry excuse for a bed and imagine a thousand more pages he'll never write in his mental novel.

"Arrête!" Francis keeps saying, stop!, or at least Arthur thinks that's it, maybe there's more sounds somewhere; it's difficult to hear with his head smushed between a hairy arm and a hairy chest. But he gives in, stops his squirming, and Francis's grip loosens. "Allonges-toi avec moi?" Lay with me? Or maybe that's what he said, Arthur's not sure. But it's something about laying and Francis is involved, and his mind doesn't remember there being anything sexual to those words uttered in that particular order.

And the desperation in that voice, in that face, as Arthur sits up and looks at him. Francis's body normally lounges with a careless grace; now his hips are one way and his shoulders the other, his face scared, his eyes sunken. Arthur can't help but reach out and stroke one cheek, because they both remember that night of too much booze where they did "lay in bed", where Francis used a verb that did have some sexual connotation and Arthur knew it. They don't talk about it, never discuss their relationship, but there are more-than-intimate touches now à cause de cette nuit.

Because of that night! He meant to think because of that night, fucking frog, getting under his skin comme ça. Like this! Like this!

A hand pulls his head to parched lips, and Francis tastes of the single croissant he managed to eat this morning, of tea Arthur let him sip at. Their hands move of their own accord, working in perfect unison, and good God how long has it been? Francis is still so, oh, oh, oh….

Fuck.

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><p>The only thing that seems to keep Francis's spirits high are, ironically, spirits. Arthur's spent so much on absinthe, on a spoon for preparing it and sugar to cloud it, but he figures it's money from the stories he wrote about Ninette. Francis's Ninette.<p>

While Francis naps across their beds they've pushed together, Arthur takes in all the images of her. There are photographs, some formal, some spontaneous, and some… well, now he's seen her naked and it's so much better than he had ever imagined. And the photographs are beautiful, but they're not the best captured images of her.

The small apartment is a mess from all the paintings, stacked against walls, on tables, against tables made of paintings. Francis doesn't paint to make money, or at least doesn't paint these to make money. He paints for clients to keep the money coming, but these are paintings he paints for himself; so of course, they are that much better à cause de ça (because of it! he scolds mentally). There are rolling hills in the French countryside where he was born, a brick schoolhouse he attended, paintings of Paris from his first weeks here, barely fourteen years old. Oh look! Arthur thinks to himself, a prostitute! and judging by the year, Francis was fifteen when he painted this one. His French lover begins to snore in the background.

No, not his French lover. He was always her French lover, and these are the ones that really capture Ninette. Ninette in a bath, her hair piled high atop her head, and the colors blur at the water line, the blue and white water with the pink and cream of her unblemished skin. Ninette in a flowing white dress, sheer, before a window, and he can see her nipples through the bodice, the lines of her ass and thighs through the skirt, head thrown over her shoulder wantonly.

Arthur's favorite is Ninette at the small table, a cup of coffee clutched in her hands. Her shirt is rumpled, probably the one she had just slept in; her hair indicates just as much. She's blowing on the coffee, cooling it with those rosy lips, but she's also smiling at her painter. At her lover. Never Arthur's, always hers.

"Qu'est-ce que tu fais?" Francis mutters. What are you doing? Arthur swallows.

"What's it called," he starts, "in French, you taught me it… it's like, the pain of loving someone-" and for a moment the words catch in his throat because the emphasis on "loving" was too strong, they've never dared to use the word for what they have. What they have is best left unspoken, their relationship too complex, their characters too stubborn. "The pain, of loving someone you can never have. What's it called? The French have a name for it." Because they would. Because they understand. Because Francis understands.

There's a pause and he hears the man shift in bed, but refuses to meet his gaze.

"La douleur exquise."

That's it. It burns in Arthur, the pain of wanting someone so badly, wanting someone he could never have, someone who could never want him, and yet.

And yet.

And yet he still wants it, still wants him, still wants Francis. Francis loved Ninette and may die of a broken heart and drug overdose, but Arthur loves Francis. He always has, deep down. Once the images of Ninette left his mind, once he wrote the novels and the short stories, all that was left of that day was Francis, smiling. Francis, laughing. Francis, handsome and beautiful. Francis, in love.

In love with another.

It's exquisite, excruciating. It's agonizing as it pulls at him, at his bones, at his skin, and he doesn't even realize he's crying until Francis wraps his arms around him, holding him. Those graceful fingers pry the canvas from his hands; Francis's hands are always covered in paint, Arthur's in ink. Their fingers lace together and it's so perfect, they both paint pictures for the world, but Arthur's are written and Francis's visual. They are so similar, such compliments. Arthur has this feeling inside of him, consuming him, and Francis has the word for it.

"As-tu trouvé la douleur exquise?"

Have you found the exquisite pain?

Their eyes meet and it's like Francis is looking into his soul. What is he to Francis? Arthur Kirkland, writer and author, of London, England. The only one who knows that name is his editor; he's too ashamed to even put his name on his books, refuses to tell the people he meets what his penname is. What is he to Francis Bonnefoy, a celebrated artist in this part of Paris? He may not be world-famous, but everywhere they go here, others stop and take notice, point as Francis passes. "That's the one, the master painter." He's brilliant with a canvas before him and paint at the ready. Arthur could never deserve such perfection.

"Arthur," Francis whispers, and this time he pronounces the "th" in his name, a foreign sound in that foreign throat. Behind that beautiful Frenchman light streams in through the window. Sound drifts up from the street. There's yellow and gray mixed together in this small room, and Francis is white and blond haired and blue eyed. His hands are on the side of Arthur's face as tears stream over them, as Arthur sobs, too afraid to break eye contact.

Francis stands and he doubles over, howling in pain.

Francis returns, and the room spins.

In his hand is a book with a simple brown cover, the title embossed in large letters: "L'ABSINTHE". At the bottom of the cover is printed Arthur's penname.

"Wha-" He never told Francis, never told him about his writings, about his penname. The man doesn't even read English does he?

But he shakes his head and so Arthur never finishes the word. Shaking hands open the book, finding some part several pages in, and Arthur realizes that between the black text is blue ink, in that same hurried handwriting Francis's letters are always written in. Every little space of the page is filled with writing, in black or blue, every bit of virgin white covered.

"Tu as écrit le sentiment, ici," and one of those paint-covered fingers points at the page. He'd written what sentiment? Arthur's eyes follow and under some line about the woman's handsome lover there is a description that follows of how he can never own her fully and how much that knowledge hurts. For paragraphs Arthur wrote of that agony, and there is a large bracket along all of it. The bracket leads to where Francis has written three simple words, "la douleur exquise."

"I never-" Arthur starts, looking up, and Francis smiles sadly.

"Mon nom," he whispers smugly, because Arthur's editor had thought a French name would give the books a better chance at selling, and Francis Bonnefoy had been the first name to come to Arthur's head.

And suddenly they're kissing, pulling at each other's clothing. In minutes they're naked, trying to cover the distance between them and the bed. But it's not worth it and so Francis lays on the ground, Arthur lowering himself onto his lover. Francis fills him in a way that he never has before, and maybe it's the absinthe still coursing through Arthur's veins. Maybe it's his imagination playing tricks on him in this sudden burst of bliss. But he thinks, as he looks down at Francis's face full of pleasure, his back arched up, hands on Arthur's hip, he thinks it's something else. It's knowing that the pain is gone, the pain between them. Arthur's hands run up and down that chest covered in fine hair as he moves up and down, Francis's arms helping him, until he cries out, throwing his head back like any one of the prostitutes on the street below. He continues his movements until Francis's back arches once again, and it's Arthur's name that escapes those lips, the "h" once again missing from its pronunciation.

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><p>His editor isn't happy when he says he's come back with six words. They're different than the ones he's left with, Arthur assures him. And they're in French.<p>

"What are they then?" his editor asks, irritated; he only lets Arthur get away with this because his sales are so good. The editor is fidgeting with a pen, keeps shooting a glance over Arthur's shoulder. "And who's that?"

Arthur hears the murmured, "Bonjour," as he produces the piece of paper. It takes several moments for his editor to grasp what he's written.

"Perfection," he says wide-eyed. "This is perfect Arthur." It's a quiet victory Arthur is very much aware that he'll never find again.

"I know," he agrees quietly, and behind him he can feel that damn frog's face fill with pride, smiling like some stupid schoolboy at his English lover, his beloved muse.

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><p>La douleur exquise: elle est morte.<p> 


End file.
